Prater drilled a 52-yard field goal with 1:35 to play that was longer than any kick Lions coach Jim Caldwell wanted to try on a windy day at Soldier Field.

Barth had a chance to tie on the ensuing possession but sent his 46-yard attempt wide right with 3 seconds to play.

“We usually set a line in pregame and say, ‘OK, if you get to this point we can kick a field goal from here. If it’s beyond that, we can’t,’ ” Caldwell said. “And really our line was not there, where we kicked it. It was quite a few yards forward of that. But I looked down at the end and he kind of gave me that nod like, ‘I got it.’ I said, ‘OK, let’s go.’ And he did a nice job.”

Prater, in a swirling wind and temperatures that hovered around freezing, was short on several kicks from inside of 50 yards during warm-ups. But kicking from the right hashmark with the game on the line, he got all of a kick that cleared the crossbar by a few feet and boinked off the field-goal post sticking out of the ground.

“Sometimes I get super dialed in and kind of black out I guess,” said Prater, who is 6 of 9 on field goals of 50 yards and beyond this season. “When I hit it, I didn’t know just cause of the conditions. I hit it about as good as I could. In the future, if it would have been another yard or two further we would have had to have probably 6 (punter Sam Martin) kick it and I would hold because he can kick farther.”

The Vikings (8-2) won their sixth straight game Sunday over the Los Angeles Rams, and lead the division by two games. Their last loss came Oct. 1 against the Lions (6-4) in Minnesota.

Lions defensive tackle Akeem Spence said he thinks whoever wins Thursday’s game will take the division.

“I’ve never been here,” Spence said. “Close to (winning the division) and a game of this magnitude. This is going to be big, man, so we’ve got to get locked in, focus up and guys got to get ready to go. We beat Minnesota early in the year, but it’s not going to be easy the second go-around cause they’ve been playing some damn good ball. Damn good ball.”

Despite Sunday’s win, their third straight, the Lions have not been playing great football.

They fell into an early 10-0 hole against one of the worst teams in the NFL for the second straight week Sunday, and needed a second-quarter defensive touchdown – D.J. Hayden’s 27-yard fumble return – to wake them from their slumber.

Jordan Howard ran for 69 of his game-high 125 yards in the first quarter, and the Bears (3-7) had 222 yards rushing as a team. The Lions allowed the winless Browns to top 200 yards on the ground last week, and have given up an average of 153.8 yards rushing over their last five games.

“It’s not just one thing,” Caldwell said. “We’re not tackling as well as we’re capable, we’re not fitting up things as well as we’re capable. There was one time we had an eight-man front, eight guys up front, and they pop one through on us. So we’ll look at that and we’ll get those things straightened away, but we’ve still got work to do.”

Howard scored on a 12-yard run in the second quarter to give the Bears a short-lived 17-7 lead — Matthew Stafford answered with touchdown passes to Marvin Jones and Ameer Abdullah in the final 5:17 of the first half for the Lions — and Tarik Cohen tied the game at 24 on a 15-yard run with 5:02 to play.

Stafford, who completed 21 of 31 passes for 299 yards on the day, drove the Lions to the Bears’ 26-yard line on the ensuing possession before a T.J. Lang penalty and Kenny Golladay drop left them in fourth-and-18 at the 34.

That’s when Prater gave Caldwell his nod, and went out and won the game.

“That’s a hell of a kick,” Stafford said. “I got a lot of confidence in that guy. He has a lot of confidence in himself, which is awesome. As a team, you send that guy out there and more often than not he’s helping you out.”

Mitchell Trubisky scrambled for 19 yards on a fourth-and-13 to keep the Bears' final drive alive, before Barth pushed his kick right.

Darius Slay breaks up a pass to the Chicago Bears' Kendall Wright in the first quarter of the Detroit Lions' 27-24 win Sunday, Nov. 19, 2017 at Soldier Field in Chicago. Kirthmon F. Dozier, Detroit Free Press

Darius Slay wags his finger after breaking up a pass against the Chicago Bears in the first quarter of the Detroit Lions' 27-24 win Sunday, Nov. 19, 2017 at Soldier Field in Chicago. Kirthmon F. Dozier, Detroit Free Press

Paul Worrilow gives up a touchdown to the Chicago Bears' Adam Shaheen in the first quarter of the Detroit Lions' 27-24 win Sunday, Nov. 19, 2017 at Soldier Field in Chicago. Kirthmon F. Dozier, Detroit Free Press

Golden Tate celebrates after making a catch against the Chicago Bears in the fourth quarter of the Detroit Lions' 27-24 win Sunday, Nov. 19, 2017 at Soldier Field in Chicago. Kirthmon F. Dozier, Detroit Free Press

Matthew Stafford is tripped up by the Chicago Bears' Mitch Unrein in the third quarter of the Detroit Lions' 27-24 win Sunday, Nov. 19, 2017 at Soldier Field in Chicago. Kirthmon F. Dozier, Detroit Free Press

A'Shawn Robinson (91) celebrates after the Chicago Bears' Connor Barth missed a field goal to tie the game in the final seconds of the Detroit Lions' 27-24 win Sunday, Nov. 19, 2017 at Soldier Field in Chicago. Kirthmon F. Dozier, Detroit Free Press

Trubisky, in his sixth career start, finished 18 of 30 passing for 179 yards, and added 53 yards on the ground.

The Lions, with road wins this year over the Bears, Vikings and Green Bay Packers, have won all of their division road games for the first time in the Super Bowl era. They don't have a team with a winning record left on their schedule after Thursday's game against the Vikings.

"I liked the fight we had in us," Caldwell said. "Oftentimes, particularly on the road, some teams take a nosedive when they get behind and don't come back. But our guys did a nice job in moving ourselves back in position by making some plays and giving us a chance to win. I'm proud of that."